Tight races, worn-out shoes and few voters

There’s an election Oct. 27 but like years past, you wouldn’t know it from these turnout figures. These results are from Wednesday and so far about 70-80 voters are coming through daily to vote, commission officials said.

Ward 1: 93 votes

Ward 2: 12 votes

Ward 3: 176 (103 early voters in precinct 11-2 Moore Elementary which is where 3 of the four ward 3 candidates reside)

Ward 4: 161 votes

That’s out of little more than 37,000 registered voters.

Clearly, every vote is going to matter more than ever in the two races where the most money is being spent: Ward 1 and Ward 3.

Challengers in both races spoke to me this week. (Ward 3 candidate Greg Caesar called after deadline so I couldn’t get his comments into my story today. I’ll put him first.)

Greg Caesar

Caesar told me that he’s nearly worn out the soles on a pair of loafers he’s been wearing during his door-to-door campaign. Should he buy a new pair or resole?

That’s the kind of expense of shoeleather that I’ve heard earlier candidates for aldermen talk about spending — and it might be the thing that makes the biggest difference. Or not.

Caesar’s also raised the most money of the Ward 3 candidates — mainly through his own pockets — but clearly he’s not relying solely on the automated phone calls to get his name out there.

“I’m not sitting idly by and waiting for the money to work,” Caesar said.

Clearly. As for predictions, he sees it as a two-horse race — though he did not name which candidates. (I’ll be bold and say it’s going to be between him and incumbent Mike Skinner.)

“I think that it will come down to a very narrow margin victory,” Caesar said. “It’s going to be pretty close between two of the candidates. I don’t see a landside cvictory.”

Meantime, in Ward 1, challenger Garry Neal says getting people to vote is one of the obstacles he’s had to face.

Garry Neal

“There has been huge voter apathy,” Neal said.

He said he chose to run because he wanted to get more involved in his communtiy. He’s taken away a lesson about running for office.

“I now undersand why good, honest hard working people don’t always run for office,” he said. “You have people who want to put up road blocks, misconstrue what they see into what they want to be said.”

Neal said it won’t be in the hands of him or any candidate but in the people who decide to vote.

“This is not in my hands,” he said. “It’s in the hands of the voters,” Neal said. “What do the voters want? Me being voter, I know what I want. I’m tried of my taxpayers money being wasted.”

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